The Goderich Signal-Star, 1986-11-05, Page 39GSS/Wednesday. Nov 5, 1986
ntario's first roads
were mere paths
When
were Ontario's first
roads constructed and what
were they like?
Historian Edwin C. Guillet
describes the Niagara portage road
Niaga1 a -on -the -Lake to Fort Erie
via Chippawa) as Ontario's first
highway.
Today most of it lies under water,
a fate that overtook the coach road
of 1803 along Lake St. Clair and
other shore routes connecting early
settlements along the Detroit River.
A well beaten trail when explorers
sighted the mighty cataract in 1640,
the Niagara portage road was
continuously improved by soldiers
and fur traders. Fifty large wagons
moved up and down daily in 1795,
taking merchandise for trans-
shipment on Lake Erie and furs to
Lake Ontario.
Three years later a stage coach
began a daily service on the portage.
As colonization progressed and
land transport became a year-round
necessity, the pioneers "paved"
their roads with tree trunks or
"corduroy", 'a name facetiously
Road building
borrowed from a rugged type of
ridged cloth then popular.
Occasionally they split the logs in
half and turned the flat side up.
More often they dropped the trunks
in the mud and heaped stone and
earth over thew. They also tried
corduroy bridges. In either case the
results were "infernal".
West of Hamilton, one Toronto
traveller in 1837 reported, "the roads
were so execrably bad, no words can
give you an idea. We often sank in
mudholes above the axle. A wheel
here and there or a broken shaft by
• the roadside told of former wrecks
and disasters. In some places they
had, in desperation, flung huge
boughs of oak in the muddy abyss,
the green foliage projecting on either
side."
Hailed with unmerited enthusiasm,
the first experimental plank road on
the North American continent near
Toronto in 1835 resulted in 500 miles
of them being constructed. Flat as a
billiard table when opened to traffic
they discouraged interest in the
macadam road, introduced to
Wagons line up, at a crushing
Britain as early as 1815.
Plank roads were not difficult to
construct and timber was plentiful.
The macadam required a base of
large rocks, a cover of small stones
and treatment by oil or tar before
being crushed and matted into a
hard, smooth surface.
With the development of the motor
car in the latter part of the century
came another revolution that was to
transform road -building into an
exact science with amazing
techniques and tools:
plant awaiting their Toads.
photogrammetry, soil surveys,
traffic studies, cost analysis,
illumination, access control, radical
changes in design and many others.
Axe and logging chain, pick,
shovel and sledge hammer, all these
hand instruments with the horse
drawn scraper and dump cart were
to take second place to the crawler
tractor and other diesel -powered
equipment as the stump road of
Governor Simcoe's time was
supplanted by the freeway.
11 Shake hands with the home
of the Great Deal
Ed Hagle - President
�.TODERICH
/RYMOUTH
HRYSLER LTD.
"Shaka hands with, the Home of tha Great Deal"
Where Service Sells Cars and Trucks!
414 Huron.Fld. Goderich 524.7383
Where service sells cars & trucks.
Top row left to right: Jim Middleton, Ken Huff, Mark Sjaarda, Mike McNichol. Back
row left to right: Dick Hagle, Don Hagle, Carl Hicks, Ken Treitz, Ed Hagle, Marietta
Shergold, Gwen Moller. Far right: Don Swan
Dedicated to an uncompromising principle that service sells cars and trucks, Goderich
Plymouth Chrysler has enjoyed continued growth in Goderich.
With his wife Vera, Ed Hagle is happy to celebrate his 5th New Car Announcement in Goderich.
Goderich Plymouth Chrysler now employs 12 staff members, two of which are Ed's sons Don
and Dick. Don has been with Ed since the beginning as head of the Parts Department and now as
Assistant General Manager. Dick who has had many years experience in the automotive service
industry, has recently taken over the running of the service dept.
"We'd like to express our thanks to the fine people and local industries in Goderich for their
continued support and look forward to many more years of success...right here in Goderich."